For Seniors: How to Print Your Work in Microsoft Office

To print from within any Microsoft Office applications, choose File→Print or press Ctrl+P. That displays the Print Settings in Backstage View. You can then set any print options desired and then click the Print button.

The exact settings found in the Print Settings vary slightly between the applications. The common features are

Number of Copies: The default is 1; you can choose to print multiple copies instead by specifying some other number.

Printer: Choose from a drop-down list of the printers installed on your system. (If you have only one printer, it’s used automatically.)

Settings: Specify which page(s) you want to print, if not the whole thing. You can print all, the current page, a custom page range, or a sheet containing the document’s properties.

Other Settings: A variety of special settings are available, such as collation, one-sided or two-sided printing, page orientation, and paper size.

Sometimes when you print something, it doesn’t look exactly how you expected. The view that you work with onscreen isn’t the same as the view that will be printed in many cases. (That’s especially true in Excel, for example.)

Print Preview is a special view in which you can see your pages exactly as they will appear when printed. Previewing your document before you print it can help you avoid needlessly printing extra copies and wasting ink and paper. Print Preview appears to the right of the Print Settings in Backstage View.